


The Imitation Game

by Nihonkikuasa211



Category: The Imitation Game (2014)
Genre: Angst, Homophobia, Introspection, M/M, Male Homosexuality, Tragedy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-24
Updated: 2016-07-24
Packaged: 2018-07-26 11:03:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,916
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7571680
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nihonkikuasa211/pseuds/Nihonkikuasa211
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Hugh reacts to Alan's death. "I'm sorry that I could only play the game."</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Imitation Game

**Author's Note:**

> Hugh Alexander did defend Alan Turing during his trial. He also was married, and had two children. Most of the information was from Alan's actual life, and I just started to wonder "What would have happened if Hugh had feelings for Alan but never told him, and found about his death? What if...he was like most of the population of homosexuals in 1950s Great Britain?" This is by no means fact, it is fiction. It would have been interesting if they did have a relationship, though. Alan Turing will always remain to me the bravest and honest man I will never know.
> 
> This my first story regarding The Imitation Game, so please be kind!

_The Imitation Game_

Hugh Alexander was vaguely aware of the newspaper falling onto the ground. There was a muffled sound from the crack of the tea mug being broken.

              His mind seemed unable to focus.

              Only on one thought.

              One word.

_Alan…_

             Hugh’s throat constricted. He couldn’t take a breath. He tried to breathe, but found it hard to even concentrate to remain upright. The tea that slightly spilled onto his hands was hot, scalding his skin as it burned. _Oh, God…_ Hugh thought.

The horror dulled through his mind as his thoughts continued to unravel. Alan Turing had died. Alan, who he could still see in his mind. Alive, as he had been when they had last spoken. Hugh swallowed heavily, attempting to breathe through the sudden information churning through his mind. _“Of course. What would I do without your input?”_ Hugh could still remember the sound of his voice. Not shaking in fear. Not afraid. Asking him something that most of society would consider disgraceful.

              It had been in 1952. Hugh had been working with the GCHQ by then. Not Alan. Alan was…doing something only he with the mind he had to come up with. Hugh, although it had taken him months to admit it after working with the pompous bastard, had slowly respected the mathematician. His mind was something that Hugh could only vaguely understand. Not because he was too smart, a genius.

              But because of who he was.

              Alan told him promptly that he was not ashamed of being a homosexual. _“There is no reason for it, Hugh. I am who I am, and I am not afraid. And so…I ask of you…”_

_“Will you defend me?”_

Perhaps a lesser man would have said no. Perhaps they would be blinded by what they perceived to be true and _decent._ Perhaps Hugh would have said no. It was common in their society to not care about people suffering from something they perceived as “unnatural.” Disgust. Hugh had met such people. For himself however…

              How could he allow such a brilliant man be convicted of something that he believed was not wrong? Those eyes, looking at him as if they could tell what he was thinking. Hugh could still remember the feel of his hand across Alan’s face. He had been angry with the man. He could have reacted as Alan’s older brother, attempting to hide the disgust as he reported the telegram he had received from his brother.

              _“I suppose you know that I am a homosexual.”_

That was the telegram. It was so much like Alan that Hugh had almost burst out with laughter. He was laughing now as he slid onto the floor, his hands shaking despite trying to gain control as the man remembered more of the man who… Hugh licked his lips. He gritted his teeth in growing rage at the memory of Alan’s naivety, believing that the _law_ would change and that he wouldn’t get a sentence. That he had done something wrong for living honestly for who he was.

              _Alan…you fool._ Those were the only words that echoed through his mind. There was no anger. Flashes of memories burned in his mind. Alan, working until it was after midnight. Riding his bicycle, Hugh’s own voice echoing in his mind as he asked the man again why he didn’t just replace the thing if the part didn’t work. _He would always count the moments until the wire would become unhinged, and he would adjust it again._ The man lying on the grass with the ever-present Joan by his side. Alan staring at him incredulously as Hugh took his sandwich. The memory of seeing his face, not moving in fear or despair as each sentence was called out.

              _“Why defend him, Alan?”_ Hugh had almost shouted as the man stared at him with his hands together. Anger had framed his face, and the older man had tried to control the frustration as he stared at the undeterred man. _“The burglary was partly his doing!”_

 _“He had no idea what his friend would do when he told him about our…affair,”_ Alan had stated calmly. Hugh had swallowed then, trying to calm himself as the younger man stared at him with faint bemusement. _“I do not want him to suffer, Hugh.”_

Alan had made the off-handed comment that he suspected that although he cared for the younger man, the _boy_ truly did not feel the same. _“Elevated to a positon that he had not been privy to before…and all of us our the same in the end, Hugh.”_

Hugh had looked at the younger man in confusion as the solicitor and the older brother pretended not to hear. Again, it seemed as if Alan’s eyes could see through him. As if he was not only decoding Enigma, but also the human in front of him.

              _“What do you mean, Alan?”_ Hugh had asked in a slightly exasperated tone, acting as if it was simply another day in Hut 8 and annoyed with the mathematician’s lack of manners.

              Alan didn’t respond at first. Hugh had stared at him, wondering what his brilliant, so naïve, and annoying mind could be thinking at this moment.

              _“We are all, to an extent, playing a game.”_ His expression remained as calm as ever as Hugh stared at his friend, his eyes widening as a knowing expression appeared in his eyes. Those blue eyes followed a picture, of Hugh with his wife Enid and their sons when they were children lying on a desk.

_“The imitation game.”_

The feel of his arm around Alan’s shoulder. The surprising warmth that radiated from the man as they stood among the fire, destroying the work they had completed in the years they had finished together. Hugh had never been so close to the said man before. Even when asking him to defend him for a crime of homosexuality, they had not touched. The memory of closeness as he could see Alan’s smile in the night.

              Watching him leave with being convicted of a crime, of a love that did not speak its name, was hard for Hugh. He of course expected that Alan would get the sentence. At the back of his mind, Hugh knew that. But seeing him stand there with no shame or despair, looking at the youth that had ended him no matter how many times Alan said it wasn’t his fault…was enough for Hugh to want to shout.

              _It’s…not right._

_Alan is dead._

Hugh didn’t know of how he died. The article soaking the forgotten tea didn’t say. His throat constricted at the reality of it. Alan, with his convictions, and everything that made him who he was, no longer lived in this world.

              He had never been so grateful that his wife was currently on a vacation in Italy.

              _God damn it!_

              Hugh didn’t know how he was crying. But he was. The tears came, thick and warm as they slid down his cheeks, into his mouth as he gasped through the numb grief. The ever-present memory of seeing Alan by the fire, his arm around the man’s shoulders. The warmth that spread through his limbs at the sound of Alan’s laughter.

              The never-fading thoughts.

“You were…such a fool.” Hugh whispered. He seemed almost incapable of anything but a whisper as the words flowed out of his mouth. For once, Hugh did not wipe away his tears. If he did, there would only be more. “Such a brave…fool. Too honest for your own good.”

_“I hate lying. So you don’t have to tell me you actually like me.”_

              “I could…never lived as you had. Living, breathing of who you truly were.” _So many times…I wondered what it would be like to truly know you. To not just feel the skin of your face from anger, but of…something more. Of how it would be if I did not only have my arm around your shoulder, but embraced you._

Hugh had hide, like so many others. He had not admitted to who he truly was. He had married, had two sons from the marriage. Was he truly that afraid of what would happen to him if he had acknowledged his heart’s truest desire? _Did you know, Alan?_ The memory of the blue eyes boring into his own, his heart almost jumping out of his ribcage at the thought of Alan knowing the feelings he had for the man buried deep inside. _What would have happened if I had…acknowledged them?_ Perhaps it had only started when Alan had left for United States. _“Anglo-American liaison, Alan!”_ He had noticed that he was thinking more and more of the mathematician as the months continued without his presence. The others, including Joan, remained the same as always. But the absence of Alan Turing left something that Hugh hadn’t truly felt before. He didn’t worship the ground he walked, but his mind revolved around the younger man more and more as the days and weeks turned into months. Hugh should have been thinking of his wife then, reading the letters by candlelight of her words about their two little boys.

              But instead, the chess champion found himself thinking about a mathematician. With his words, and calculations, wondering if he had insulted anyone to the point of insanity. Hugh had almost lost himself in laughter when he had heard from Joan that Alan had almost been denied access the United States. _“And what,”_ he had asked somewhat breathlessly to the younger woman who was smiling as well, _“did Alan have to say?”_

 _“Something only Alan would say,”_ she had replied, her eyes twinkling at the mirth clouding Hugh’s expression.

The previous annoying comments and infuriating attitude had turned into something similar to nostalgia. Hugh had been stunned by the happy emotion he had felt when Alan had finally returned from the United States, finished with irritating their allies across the Atlantic.

Although, the older man had not acted. If Alan was truly as honest as he was, the man would have told him if he had feelings for Hugh. He valued truth above all things. Unlike so many others, Alan was not ashamed. And so…was it not simply enough to see the man every day and watch him work, see his brilliance and odd humor when it came? Teasing him eventually became a pastime fore Hugh, and he enjoyed seeing Alan’s various expressions. The last memory they had together as code breakers, watching the fire burn as his arm was slung around another man’s shoulders, that he believed was beyond his reach.

              “The bravest man I have known…you, Alan…”

              Hugh lifted his face, attempting to stop the tears that were continuously flowing from his eyes. _The brilliant man that you were…dying so young when you could have accomplished so much…_

_For what you did in the war, of what I said during the trial…dying, Alan…_

“I’m sorry that I could simply play the game.”

              Hugh closed his eyes and rested his head against the cold wood. He breathed, taking in air and the words of the article he had read shifting through his mind.

              The tears continued. The words continued to blur until Hugh couldn’t remember them anymore, and all that remained was a blurred memory.

              Alan. Of his back facing him. His eyes, a blue that Hugh remembered now clearly, not afraid.

              _“The imitation game.”_


End file.
